Well then they should be lining up to say goodbye to me. I'm almost 33 and only worked 6 months out of my life. I've been on disability since I was 16 and since I didn't work enough to pay into it , it's all government money. Yet every cent I get is one they would have beeb able to keep if it wasn't so hard to die. Lol
Unfortunately even you have value to the system still. Sure the government is losing money, but every day you have to live you have to use that money to pay for your own needs and expenses. So some corporations and possibly local businesses get paid, which flows back to the government through taxes (or in the case of big corporations bribes to politicians). Animals don't handle money so the most money that gets funneled through them is through their owners, who may simply decide to stop spending that money if they were not allowed to get their animal euthanized when they want.
Also, although I do not know your specific situation, most people on disability of any sort do not get enough money from the gov. to survive, which means either family or charitable organizations have to step in to help, which means more money having to be spent by the family of disabled individuals (or charity, though there isn't enough charity to go around so a lot of people are just SOL on that).
I find the whole pet care thing so bizarre. Don't get me wrong: I love their cuteness and companionship but it's like having a little prisoner in your home who is fully dependent on you and whose only purpose it is to make you happy. And after all they can not voice their consent to anything: how do you know your cat likes its food or blanket? Maybe it just eats it because there's nothing else and lies down because it has to rest. Even purring is a thing cats do to calm themselves - so they might not even like your company or state they're in. Most smaller animals suffer in silence and just stop eating when something's wrong - whatever it might be - and then we go ahead and euthanize them - eventhough we cant be entirely sure what's going on. Weird weird system.
Rant off.
Euthanasia is a good thing though and should definitely made available for every creature on earth.
I've thought about this a lot lately. Is it even ethical to own pets?
I sincerely hope that the animals I have and care for truly are happy, but how would I really know for sure?
A lot of pet owners get a pet because they want something that will "love them unconditionally", but do animals really have that capability any more than humans do? A lot of the time it seems like what pet owners perceive as "unconditional love" is pure dependency. Their dog, for example, follows them around and showers them with "affection", but in the end doesn't he have to do that in order to continue being cared for? He may feel as the lowest ranked member of the family, with no ability to wander around and hunt on his own, that he HAS to show this display of "loyalty" and "affection" in order to have his needs met.
Likewise we most often choose to spay/neuter our pets, and we claim it is for their benefit so they don't have "unwanted litters" and to avoid more wild animals in the area, but this is entirely based off our own needs and wants. If our pets could speak I am almost certain that just like most humans, they would want a fair chance at having babies of their own and passing their genes down. We literally control who gets to continue their bloodline and who doesn't, not through natural selection and them having a chance at the freedom to struggle for survival and all that comes with it, but based on whether or not WE want to deal with their offspring.
At the end of the day there's a reason most people have to keep their pets locked up inside the house or behind some inescapable fence. It's because given the chance most animals would run away to go explore the world, would not have the skills it needs being domesticated, and would probably die; and even IF they don't die they probably won't be coming back home for anything more than the occasional visit, if at all. A lot of pet ownership seems to go hand-in-hand with humans needing to have control over something. Most people don't have all that much control over their own lives, but they CAN lock an animal up in a little cage, choose when to feed and water them, choose what their environment will be, their playtimes, what toys they have, etc, etc.
And don't even get me started on the exotic pets people get and don't care for properly, just because they want to have something "unique", even if that animal is by all rights a WILD animal with very specific needs that often aren't met and then they just suffer until they die.